Piston-ring spring



Dct. 192%..

H. C. PHELPS PISTON R-LNG SPRING Fil d Sen 1922 Patented Get. 21, 1924.

HENRY C. PHELPS, OF BURBANK, CALIFORNIA.

PISTON-RING SPRING.

Application filed September 8, 1922. Serial No. 586,814.

To all whom it may concern:

Be it known that I, HENRY C. PHELPS, a

citizen of the United States, residing at Burbank, in the county of Los Angeles'and State of California, have invented new and useful Improvements in Piston-Ring Springs, of which the following is a specification.

' This invention relates to piston ring devices, and more particularly to springs for expanding rings of pistons against the cylinder walls.

It is an object of the present invention to provide an, improved piston ring spring to obtain a greater length of life of the springs, and more particularly it is anobject of the invention to provide for an increased zone of bearing contacts between the spring and the bottom of the piston groove against which the spring reacts.

Other objects will be made manifest in the following specification of an embodiment of the invention illustrated in the accompanying drawings, in which'- Figure 1 is a horizontal section through an engine cylinder and its piston and showing the improved ring in plan;

Figure 2 is a vertical central section of the device;

Figure 3 is a rectilinear projection in plan of the spring.

Fig. at is a sectional view, on an enlarged scale, showing the setting of the spring.

The device of the present invention. is shown as combined with an internal combustion engine cylinder 2 in which operates a piston 3 having the usual ring grooves 4 in which are retained the piston rings 5. It is the practice to provide means for ex panding the rings 5 outwardly against the wall of the cylinder and ordinarily these usual rings quickly wear at the points of contact where they rest against the bottom of the rin grooves 4.

It is a Iroad object of the invention to lengthen the life of the ring springs by providing greater bearing area. As clearly shown in Figure 3, the spring is formed with a number of transverse corrugations or concavo-convex curves having alternately convex bows 7 will be disposed contiguous to the bottom of its groove 4 in the piston.

A feature of my invention is that the inner bows 7 of the spring are concaved by slight or short inwardly pressed portions 8 at the crest of each bow 7. In other words, the inner convex curves of the packing spring are dented inwardly and this results in the formation of an elongated bearing spot engaging the bottom of the respective groove.

From this it will be seen that in a given spring with a suitable number of bows 7 the zones of contact of the bows will be increased by the indentations 8 which produce the contiguous bearing lands and, therefore, I have provided a ring of greater durability and length of life as compared to the usual concavo-convexly bowed springs.

The convex bows 6 have flattened crests 6 which bend as the ring is coiled to fita groove. These crests then flex outwardly with a radius much larger than the radius of the bows and approximate the curvature of the cylinder wall.

Further embodiments, modifications and changes may be resorted to within the spirit of the invention as here claimed.

What is claimed is;

A piston ring expanding spring consisting of a strip of flat stoclg transversely corrugated from end to end to form alternately disposed short and long bows, the innermost bows of the ring forming bearing lands, the outer bows having flattened crests.

In testimony whereof I have signed my name to this specification.

HENRY G. PHELPS. 

